Fracture
by Roksiel
Summary: When love is suppressed, hatred takes its place.
1. The Thing That Would Not Be

Contrary to popular belief, Izaya's frequent visits to Ikebukuro had nothing to do with Shizuo (at least not anymore). He went where his job took him, and if his job took him to the last place he wanted to go to because of a certain monster with inhuman strength and bleached hair who had made it clear that he hated him more than anything in the world, then that's where he went. Running into the blond was never a pleasant experience, every new meeting an echo of their first one. _"I don't like you,"_ the memory of those words pierced through his heart since long turned to stone, and it no longer hurt as much.

Their enmity started back in their Raijin days, and Izaya still remembered it as though it'd happened yesterday. His eyes first landed on Shizuo during their Entrance Ceremony. He was watching the students walk through the school gate, waiting for the chance to catch a glimpse at this human with abnormal strength that Shinra so often talked about. It could've been the stories he heard about that unnatural strength, or perhaps something else entirely, but if there was one thing Izaya knew, it was that he had to meet this guy with blonde hair, color which usually served as a warning for others to stay away, who out of the whole crowd had noticed him staring down at them from behind the glass of the school's second floor's hallway.

He spent the next few weeks observing the blond, each new fight he witnessed cementing his belief that Shizuo was as different from the rest just as Izaya himself was. It never took too much to make Shizuo explode into a whirlwind of punches and destroyed school property (from desks and chairs to parts of the fence), and the wilder the blond got, the faster Izaya's heart raced. He couldn't wait to talk to Shizuo, but he didn't want to rush their first meeting and risk ruining everything. He would wait until after one of the many fights Shizuo got into and appear as a friend when everyone else wanted nothing to do with him, surprising the blond with the contrast in attitude towards him.

If there was one thing Izaya had noticed during his weeks of observation, it was that while some people flocked to him, most avoided Shizuo, ran away from him or simply attacked him. Out of those who had a problem with the blond, only few were wise enough to recognize right away that he was a force to be reckoned with and step back before learning it the hard way, which usually meant broken bones and weeks of hospitalization.

His former classmate from middle school offered to introduce him to Shizuo on more than one occasion, but Izaya kept finding excuses to postpone it because he didn't think it was the right time yet. Shinra and Shizuo had been in the same class before the two got separated when they went to middle school, and Izaya had no doubts that Shinra had his own reasons for wanting the two of them to meet. Shinra was also different, a human crazy enough to risk his own life for someone he didn't even care about, but while Izaya's interest was with the human thinking process and how individuals interacted with one another, Shinra's sole fascination was with the human body.

On the other hand, Izaya deduced from his observations that while Shizuo wanted friends (the proof being that he talked to Shinra instead of avoiding all sorts of human contact), he disliked company for the simple reason that most people irritated him and he couldn't help but punch or kick them into next week for the smallest of things. It was exactly why Izaya had high hopes for this friendship he expected to develop between them, friendship that would hopefully blossom into something more.

Izaya couldn't remember when it happened exactly, but somewhere along the way he'd fallen for Shizuo. It was a strange thing to fall for someone since he'd normally be the object of affection and not the other way around, but he welcomed the feelings he was certain would be returned. After so much fighting, Shizuo would be relieved to find someone he could calmly talk to about anything. Most people assumed that Shizuo was nothing more than a dumb brute, but Izaya knew that wasn't the case. The only thing left for him to do was to confirm how right he'd been this whole time.

When Izaya concluded that it was finally time to meet Shizuo, he mentioned the blond's name and waited for Shinra to once again offer to introduce his two friends to one another. There was this gleam in Shinra's eyes, as though he was just about to witness an interesting experiment take place, and Izaya was starting to believe that his old friend was just as excited about the whole thing as he was.

It was a surprisingly hot autumn afternoon when Shizuo had just finished wiping the floor with a group of guys now lying on the school's football field, gate flying high in the air before the dust settled and he turned to him, eyes locking as Izaya couldn't help but applaud this unique human with godly strength. Only simpletons with no special skills in the art of fighting would challenge the blond, but they had entertained him with their foolishness, so Izaya would forgive them for their impudence.

"This is Orihara Izaya. He went to our middle school," Shinra started and then went on to inform Shizuo that his middle school classmate was not a very good person.

Still smirking, Izaya playfully admonished Shinra for the remark, but Shinra immediately clarified that he hadn't meant it in a bad way. It was more than a bit funny, especially when Shinra was still ranting, but their friendly banter ended abruptly when Shizuo's voice reached his ears and the words registered in his mind.

"I don't like you," the statement cut through Izaya's heart like a scythe slicing him across the chest, his mask almost slipping as sharp and intense pain focalized in that one organ that used to race each time he thought of Shizuo.

Luckily, it didn't. Instead, he continued to smirk, hoping to give the blond the impression that he couldn't have cared less about not being liked. "Too bad," he said in a voice sounding surprisingly steady for someone who was crumbling on the inside and whose guts had twisted into a cold, tight knot of worry. He knew then, as they gazed into each other's eyes, that everything from there on would depend on whatever happened in the following minutes. "And here I thought you and I could have some fun—"

"Shut up," Shizuo demanded, turning away from him in a display of dismissal.

"Don't be like that, Shizuo-kun," he tried again in a last attempt to salvage the situation by giving the blond one last chance to redeem himself, but Shizuo ran up to him and swung his fist, by doing so creating an irreparable fracture between them.

The utter rejection coming from this person he'd wrongly believed to be worthy of his attention and affection nearly paralyzed him, but he still managed to evade the attack, Shizuo's strength turning out to be useless against Izaya's superior speed and agility. He almost couldn't believe that he'd been mistaken in his initial assessment of the blond's personality, but now he knew better and he steeled his mind on teaching Shizuo that no one treated Orihara Izaya as though he was an insect to be stepped on without suffering any consequences.

Before Shizuo could avoid the attack, Izaya flicked open his switchblade and slashed him across the chest, carving into the monster's skin the pain Izaya felt tearing apart a broken heart that used to beat faster for an unworthy creature that turned out to be a beast instead of a god. It hurt so much that it felt as though his throat had closed up and he could no longer breathe, but his expression betrayed nothing of the anguish engulfing his whole being.

"See? It's fun, isn't it?" Izaya added as he pulled back the switchblade, momentarily pushing aside the hurt to relish the sight of a shocked monster. He doubted anyone else before him had faced this brute and walked away unscathed, let alone going so far as to draw blood.

Nearby, Shinra was smiling, clearly enjoying the turn of events. It sort of bothered Izaya that his friend was laughing at his misfortune, but he couldn't really blame Shinra for being himself. His attention turned back to Shizuo and they stared at each other for a few long moments until the monster lunged at him and Izaya broke into a sprint, heart in tatters while his thoughts burst forward at the speed of light as he tried to figure out how he could've made such a huge mistake.


	2. Some Kind of Monster

The day they met and tried to kill each other, Shizuo chased him throughout Ikebukuro, Izaya stopping once in a while and slashing at the protozoan to remind him that he was not an opponent he could intimidate. Unlike the others who had gone against the blond, he was not weak. In fact, Shizuo should've known better than to piss off Orihara Izaya, because now Izaya would have to tear the idiot's life to shreds as retribution for breaking his heart. He would continuously ruin the monster's life until the day he got bored of toying with the clearly inferior creature that had the audacity to reject him without even giving him a chance.

He never forgot to smirk throughout the chase even though his heart kept on shattering into smaller pieces the longer it lasted, every step he took while running away from Shizuo strengthening his belief that the blond was not above humans, but below them. Shizuo was clearly a dumb monster that Izaya could not afford to love, so he'd have no choice but to push back the strong feelings his broken heart had been incapable of tossing away the second he got acquainted with the real Heiwajima Shizuo. He would have to work hard on suppressing this inconvenient love until nothing would be left inside his heart besides hatred and disdain when it came to the monster who'd hated him from hello.

Unlike the brute following him, Izaya always paid attention to his surroundings, especially when crossing the street as to avoid getting hit by a car. He knew exactly which direction to take and how fast to run, and even though his expectations of Shizuo had plummeted into the abyss earlier that day, he was still shocked to hear the sounds of a horn going off and of a body being hit, followed by a grunt of pain coming from the blond. For a second, when he realized what'd just happened (how could anyone be so careless?), he froze in his tracks, heart hammering wildly inside his chest as the thought of Shizuo dying speared through his mind.

The deafening silence didn't last for long though, and it was followed by a gasp and heavy breathing coming from the fallen brute. The pain in his chest lessened when he saw the blond stirring on the ground, but his lips curled into a sneer before it switched to a smirk and he approached the driver who appeared to be frantic over hitting someone.

"It's okay. It's okay," he assured him as he retrieved his wallet from the back pocket. "He's built tough," he then added as he pulled out a few bills.

"Is he really alright?" the man stuttered, worried that he might end up in prison.

"It's fine. It's fine," Izaya insisted as he handed him some money. "Good work."

Leaving Shizuo to writhe like a worm in the middle of the street (not that he actually was, but Izaya would've liked to see it happen), he headed towards Shinra's apartment on legs that felt like cotton. It wasn't that he'd been scared (the thought alone made him sneer), but the whole thing had been emotionally taxing and he couldn't wait to get his injuries treated, go home, take a shower and jump into bed, the only place where he would finally allow himself the privilege of crumbling to pieces if only for a night.

Because he was smiling as he walked down the street, nothing looked amiss to the people passing him by, but maintaining the facade was proving to be harder than anticipated and he doubted his mask would last for much longer at the pace he could feel the fissures appearing, manifesting on the outside through a twitching eye or a quivering hand. He wished he could go back and tear out the monstrous heart that didn't resonate with his own, to make Shizuo feel the agony of having it crushed by someone else, but he couldn't. He shouldn't. In the end, he didn't.

Shinra received him with that idiotic smile on his face, and Izaya returned it with a smirk, hoping that the bubbling idiot couldn't read him well enough to see what was going on in his heart. Even if Shinra suspected something, Izaya had no intention of ever confirming it for him.

He didn't really think that his friend would betray him, but he couldn't risk it. Shinra already knew too much about him, and Izaya didn't like the idea of others possessing information which could be used against him.

"Interesting," Shinra chirped as he started disinfecting the abrasions on Izaya's right hand. "What happened here?"

Izaya shrugged, not really caring to answer.

"Don't tell me that Shizuo-kun caught you!" Shinra gasped, but his eyes were twinkling with amusement and it irritated Izaya.

It wasn't easy, considering how heartbroken he felt on the inside, but he swallowed the insults he was one step away from spewing and instead chose to answer calmly. "I took a tight turn and scrapped my hand against the—"

There was a loud noise coming from the hallway and Shinra momentarily abandoned his task to go see what was happening.

"Oh, what a coincidence! Izaya's here too!"

Judging by the beastly grunts, the uninvited guest was Shizuo, who had either come there to get medical attention or to beat Shinra to a bloody pulp for thinking that introducing him to Izaya was a good idea. Celty was trying to calm him down, but Shizuo had ripped the door from its hinges and was obviously planning to use it as a weapon against Izaya or against both of them.

It was much too soon to face Shizuo again, but Izaya still locked eyes with the blond, his usual expression back into place. "More importantly, why aren't you hurt?" It was a valid question, considering the brute had just been hit by a truck, but one he expected no answer to.

"Kill! Kill! Kill!" Shizuo started as he raised the door to hit Izaya in the head with it, but Celty moved in between them, trying to calm him down before things escaladed and someone got hurt.

Running away was out of the question, for Izaya was no coward, so he waited until Shinra had finished bandaging his hand before he got up and walked out of the apartment, leaving behind a fuming Shizuo who was surprisingly no longer bleeding from the cut on his chest.

Izaya didn't remember much of what happened on his way home, thoughts of Shizuo irradiating him, melting the grey matter of his brain and leaving him unable to think clearly. Shizuo was like poison, tainting his heart and affecting his brain. He mostly stumbled into his room, one hand gripping the red t-shirt as he collapsed on the bed, the mental and physical exhaustion finally taking their toll.

It took him half an hour to find the strength to get up, undress and take a shower, the desperate need to get rid of the dust and sweat covering his body after running for so many hours pushing his limbs into motion even though he wanted nothing more than to curl into a tight ball and hopefully fall asleep. His brain needed a reboot more than it needed food, so when he got out of the shower, with bloodshot and red-rimmed eyes, it wasn't because he'd been crying, but simply because he was sleepy. His face wasn't slick with tears, no; it had merely been the hot water beating down on him. Surely, he would never cry over a stupid monster, one unworthy of the attention and affection he'd tried to bestow upon it.

That night, after much tossing and turning in his bed, he finally fell asleep, light brown eyes haunting his dreams and turning them into nightmares as Izaya relived the rejection he'd experienced earlier that day. When he woke up, he thirsted for blood, and the first thing he did after grabbing something to eat (after all, he needed his strength), was to sic some of his game pieces on Shizuo.

And so it went on for years, their enmity growing in intensity until their deep hatred for one another became known throughout the city and people started referring to Shizuo as Ikebukuro's strongest while Izaya became the daredevil the monster seemed incapable of catching.

With every insult, every fist swung at him and every vending machine thrown in his direction, Izaya's love for Shizuo died a little more, as did the informant's admiration for that strength which he came to despise. Shizuo was an unpredictable beast, that disproportionate strength often used to throw a wrench into his plans whenever he'd run into the protozoan who was under the erroneous impression that Ikebukuro belonged to him and him only. It didn't, and it never would; that was a fact.


	3. Bloodthirsty Monsters

While time can never truly heal all wounds, it can certainly dull the pain caused by some of them. Izaya no longer felt his heart being crushed between monstrous hands each time he ran into Shizuo, but the brute was still very much capable of inflicting new wounds. The blood running down the side of his face served as a testimony to that fact, as did the dislocated shoulder Izaya doubted he could pop back into place by himself before Shizuo picked up his trail again.

But as the saying goes, _when it rains it pours,_ Izaya had the misfortune of running into a few people who just so happened to have a strong grudge against him. "Is there a problem?" he chirped innocently even as he was being trapped in the middle of an alleyway by several men armed with switchblades and baseball bats.

"Orihara Izaya, as funny as always," the leader said, laughing along with his men for a good twenty or so seconds until he raised a hand and everyone stopped abruptly. "Not." Glaring at the informant, he began advancing towards him, fingers tightening around the bat he couldn't wait to slam into the bloodied head. "Clearly I'm not the only one who wants to bash your skull in," he remarked while pointing to the left side of his face, mirroring the informant's injury.

Sighing, Izaya flicked open his switchblade, slightly bent his knees and raised his right arm to chest level (it was a good thing he was ambidextrous), assuming a defensive stance. "Indeed, but you're clearly taking advantage of the situation."

"Wouldn't you?" the man asked as he too raised his weapon and gripped it tightly with both hands.

Momentarily forgetting about his dislocated shoulder, Izaya attempted to shrug, something he immediately came to regret when a fresh wave of pain flared from his shoulder and washed over his body. His face scrunched up in agony and a hiss slipped through his tightly clenched teeth (the blunder making some of the thugs closing in on him snicker), but he quickly hid his pain and forced a lazy smile on his face even as he fought to push back the dizziness threatening to get him killed by suddenly intensifying at such an inopportune time.

Izaya was obviously not in top shape, but he still easily evaded the leader's incoming attack, as well as the switchblade nearly piercing his side (wielded by one of the many underlings hoping to impress their boss by taking down the enemy), but he couldn't avoid the third attack manifesting in the form of a metal bat hitting his dislocated shoulder and violently propelling him into the wall. He cried out in pain, a scream that was cut short when the air was knocked out of his lungs by a vicious punch to his stomach. He crumpled to the floor, gasping for air that would not come while laughter he couldn't even hear because of the loud ringing in his ears boomed around him and reverberated across the alleyway.

Now looming over the fallen informant, the gang leader waited until Izaya could breathe again before he pushed the bat beneath the man's chin and forced his head up. "You don't always get to win," he gleefully taunted, hoping to see Izaya's defeated expression, but the corners of the informant's lips went up and the man grinned at him, the sight of those white teeth stained by blood making him see red with fury. "I'll show you!" he roared as he ruthlessly slammed his foot into Izaya's jaw, sending the already bleeding head crashing into the wall behind.

Izaya felt his brain rattle inside his skull at the impact and he nearly blacked out, a new wound opening in his scalp and more blood soaking his hair. The thug was spewing ridiculous insults meant to hurt him, but words coming from a lowlife meant nothing to someone like him. The only thing Izaya cared about was finding a way to get out of there so that he could pay Shizuo back for throwing a vending machine at him no more than fifteen minutes earlier, the dislocated shoulder and the head injury resulted from that encounter being the main reason why he was now at the mercy of a man who seemed determined to either kill him or beat him within an inch of his life.

"Oi, you still alive?" the man asked as he poked the bleeding head with the bat, the informant twitching and mumbling something indecipherable. Orihara Izaya was most likely trying to beg for his life, so the man leaned forward (hoping to hear him better) until his ear was right beside the informant's lips. "What? You want me to spare your miserable life?" he mocked, laughing.

"I s-said… _don't move,"_ Izaya hissed the command as he pressed the sharp edge of a throwing knife into the man's throat. He'd lost his grip on the switchblade when he hit the wall, the bastard he was now threatening having kicked it away before Izaya could retrieve it. In the grand scheme of things, it was a fortunate thing that he hadn't used his last throwing knife on Shizuo before he lost him and entered the alley. "And put the bat down, _now!"_

"Okay, you got it; putting it down now, slowly," the man assured his prey turned captor as he lowered his hand and placed the bat on the dirty ground.

Ignoring the black spots tainting his vision and the sensation of reeling threatening to send him plummeting to the ground, Izaya made sure not to lose his prisoner as he put all of his strength into getting up. He was surprisingly steady on his feet as he stood there in the middle of the alleyway, smirking at the foolish humans who'd thought he'd been defeated.

"Make way!" Izaya ordered the enraged underlings who seemed torn between attacking and getting out of the way. "Move or I'll slit his throat!" he threatened, but the crowd of thugs only parted when their boss ordered them to listen to _"this bastard,"_ as the man put it. Izaya's eyes drifted over to the switchblade he'd dropped earlier but they only lingered for a moment before he tore them away and stared straight ahead, knowing that he couldn't risk retrieving it.

Consoling himself with the thought that he had a couple more switchblades at home, Izaya walked out of the alley with his prisoner, telling the others not to follow if they wanted their boss back in one piece. He'd learned over the years that if he wanted something done, he'd have to do it himself. Waiting around and hoping to be rescued was not in his nature, which is why he always fought with everything he had to find a way out of every dangerous situation he found himself in.

"You've never been too smart, have you, Ma~tsu~da~? I mean, you had the advantage and yet look at you now~" Izaya quipped, enjoying his prisoner's enraged snarl. "Why yes, I do remember you," he chirped, doing his best to hide that he was one step away from losing consciousness. The blood loss was making it hard for him to maintain control over his limbs, and he had no doubts that Matsuda would not hesitate to attack him if the knife pressed against his throat started swaying. "You're nobody."

"Shut up," Matsuda growled, "I'll fucking kill—"

Instead of waiting for the man to finish spewing his threat, Izaya elbowed him on the side of his head as hard as he could, Matsuda hitting the hard surface of the wall they were walking next to and losing consciousness at the impact. Izaya himself nearly fell as well, but he leaned against the wall, lowered his head and closed his eyes, hoping to chase away the lightheadedness if he took a few moments to recover.

As soon as he was certain that he wouldn't pass out, he shoved the blade back into his pocket and pulled out his phone, slowly typing a message and sending it to Celty before moving away from Matsuda's unconscious form and heading towards the rendezvous spot. He tried to stick to alleys and side streets, but he still ran into a few people who either gasped or screeched when they saw him. He obviously didn't make a pretty picture with blood running down the side of his face, but luckily he soon met up with Celty who was already waiting for him at the designated spot.

[Shizuo?] she couldn't help but ask.

"Not all of them," Izaya answered weakly as Celty helped him get on the bike and secured him with her shadowy smoke. She then gingerly placed a helmet on his head and drove off, but not before messaging Shinra and letting him know that she was en route with an injured Izaya.


	4. Seek and Destroy

The day Shizuo met Izaya, he tried to kill him. There was no real reason, he just didn't like him. Whenever someone asked why, he couldn't really answer. When pressured to answer, sometimes he'd say it was the smirk while others he'd simply send that person flying. What Shizuo wanted to be able to say though was that things didn't change much after that afternoon, but the truth was that his already less than peaceful life plummeted into chaos after Shinra had the 'bright' idea of introducing Izaya to him. The pest (the nickname Shizuo gave him because that's exactly what Izaya was) almost immediately sent gangs after him, the many fights he was forced into getting him in trouble both at school and at home.

The nightmare didn't end even after they graduated, Izaya doing everything in his power to ruin Shizuo's life any way he could. Ikebukuro turned into their battlefield, people soon learning to get out of their way if they didn't want to end up as collateral victims to the volatile monster and the dangerous informant. Years went by (almost in the blink of an eye) and Shizuo failed to catch Izaya most of the times, but once in a while he'd get lucky. Their latest fight ended with Izaya getting a bleeding head and a dislocated shoulder, but even with those injuries the pest still succeeded in slicing Shizuo's arm.

_Just another day in Ikebukuro,_ Shizuo thought as he angrily bit down on the cigarette, struggling not to growl the mantra of _kill kill kill_ when Izaya was nowhere in sight. The flea always somehow managed to avoid getting his neck broken, easily slipping through Shizuo's fingers like he was this ethereal thing instead of nothing more than a loathsome insect. "Izaya," Shizuo hissed through gritted teeth as he balled his hands into fists and continued to look for the flea, refusing the give up when there was still a certain stench in the air which he always associated with brown with a hue of red eyes and an annoying smirk.

Shizuo thought it was a shame that Izaya wasn't bleeding more; following a blood trail would've been much easier than having to rely on his instinct to lead him into the right direction as he made his way through side streets and alleyways. Giving his arm a quick look, he felt his ire rise, the cut and the blood soaking it making the shirt unusable. Izaya had destroyed another one of the precious uniforms Shizuo had received from Kasuka, and even though it wasn't the first time (nor would it be the last), he was still seeing red.

"Kill! Kill! Kill!" he started muttering under his breath, not even paying attention to his surroundings as he turned right and entered an alley, his feet leading him inside despite the dangerous-looking group of men standing in the middle and blocking the route. Shizuo expected them to move (after all, he'd made a name of himself, even if not intentionally), but nothing happened as he approached them so he took it upon himself to make way by placing his hands on the shoulders of two of them and pushing the unlucky men to the side, freeing enough space to pass through.

"The hell you think you're doing?" one of them barked and pulled out a knife.

Shizuo only heard half of what the guy was saying, the rest having stopped registering in his mind the moment he caught sight of Izaya's switchblade lying on the ground. Wanting to make sure that it was really the flea's weapon, he moved towards it to pick it up, but one of the man stepped in front of it, knife poised to attack if Shizuo so much as moved an inch. A swift glance around revealed that he'd been surrounded, and since he was in a bit of a hurry, he didn't feel like wasting precious time he could spend tracking Izaya. "You're in my way. Step aside while you can still walk," he warned as he threw the cigarette butt on the ground and crushed it under the sole of his shoe, all the while hoping that he wouldn't have to fight since he wasn't in the mood to deal with yet another gang.

"Wait, he's—" one of them started, but by then it was already too late.

The sound of a bat snapping in half on impact was almost immediately followed by those of anguished screams, resounding throughout the alleyway and mixing with those of bones breaking and bodies hitting the ground. It was over before the guy who had tried to warn the others even had a chance to escape, the terrified-looking man just standing there as the horror of what he had witnessed left him paralyzed with fear. All he could do was watch with eyes wide open as Ikebukuro's beast stomped towards him, the burning fury in Heiwajima Shizuo's eyes turning his knees to jelly. His legs gave out from under him and he fell on his ass, stuttered apologies and begging to be spared by the monster looming over him and cracking his knuckles.

Shizuo didn't normally stop once he got started, but the pathetic sight the man was making, violently trembling and crying like a coward at his feet, made him lower his arms and turn on his heels, choosing to look for the switchblade he assumed was Izaya's instead of breaking the guy's bones. He had to kick a few unconscious bodies out of the way to find it, and he confirmed on closer inspection that it was really the flea's knife, the same one the insect had used to ruin yet another one of his shirts.

Growling low in his throat, he pushed the blade back into place and pocketed it, all the while fighting the impulse to crush it in the palm of his hand. He had no doubts that it would piss off the flea to know that his precious switchblade had ended up in enemy hands, and Shizuo had every intention of letting Izaya know what happened to it as soon as he found the bastard; after taking care of his injuries. His head was bleeding pretty badly and there was a deep cut gushing blood on the left side of his stomach, not to mention the gash in his arm that had tinted his sleeve crimson.

The wounds didn't really bother him that much, but he knew better than to ignore them after that one time when he'd nearly bled to death (or so he recalled Shinra saying). While he'd caused a lot of trouble for his family over the years, he doubted that any of them would want to see him dead. Letting out a frustrated sigh, he headed towards Shinra's apartment, his hand itching to crush to smithereens the switchblade he was hiding in his pocket.

It was dark outside by the time he reached the underground doctor's apartment, feeling cold, hungry and irritated after the extremely shitty day he ended up having because of Izaya. He hoped to relax a bit and talk to Celty while Shinra patched him up, but that went down the drain when he stopped in front of the door and he realized that the whole place reeked of flea.

A vein popped beneath the skin of his forehead and his hands shot forward, strong arms tearing the door from its hinges and raising it in the air as he made his way inside and towards the living room. He didn't even notice Celty until she was right in front of him (as though she'd suddenly materialized out of thin air), blind to everything around him the moment his eyes locked with brown-red irises and every muscle in his body demanded to _kill kill kill_ Izaya once and for all. He should've realized sooner that the louse would come to Shinra to patch him up, and he was so pissed that he couldn't even hear what the doctor was saying.

Ignoring the murderous-looking blond, Shinra turned to Izaya, eyes wide in surprise. "You don't expect me to believe you did all this!" he stated incredulously, leaving Celty to deal with his former classmate who was still holding the door above his head and snarling at the raven sitting calmly in the armchair.

Rolling his eyes, Izaya turned to Shinra, deciding to answer the doctor's question as thanks for patching him up. "I only lay claim to the gash on his arm," Izaya clarified, sinking further into the armchair even as the brute was trying to get past Celty to break his neck or possibly rip his head off. The beast roared a moment later and Izaya turned to Shizuo, but the animalistic sound was followed by absolute silence that lasted for a good while until the blond sneered, placed the door against the wall and turned to him with an unnerving smirk plastered over that idiotic face.

"Flea, guess what I found earlier?" Shizuo asked, shoving a hand into the pocket of his pants.


	5. Killing Time

"The neuron you lost sometimes during our fight earlier this evening?" Izaya surmised, looking thoroughly bored and like he was one step away from falling asleep. As if on cue, Shizuo growled lowly in his throat but said nothing, instead pulling out something out of his pocket that Izaya immediately recognize as the switchblade he had no choice but to abandon in that alleyway. Honestly surprised at the unexpected turn of events, he tensed and his eyes went wide for a fraction of a second, but he immediately schooled his expression into one of indifference before anyone could catch his momentary change in demeanor.

"Is that your switchblade, Izaya-kun?" Shinra inquired, smiling innocently as he watched the informant pretend not to care that one of his precious switchblades had fallen into the blond's hands. After knowing each other for so many years, there was no doubt in Shinra's mind that beneath his friend's calm exterior, there was a volcano waiting to erupt. Even the injuries Izaya had sustained wouldn't be enough to deter him from going after Shizuo if the dam broke and the man were to fall prey to the deep resentment he felt towards the man he'd failed to befriend.

Turning to Shinra, Izaya assumed a pensive look and hoped that his ruse would work against Shizuo who even though was a lower life form, was not exactly stupid. "It's possible, but I won't be able to tell unless I take a closer look," Izaya answered in the most indifferent tone he could muster, knowing that the second he showed interest in the object the brute held in his hand, all would be lost.

Pissed that he wasn't getting the reaction he was hoping for out of the louse seemingly relaxing in Shinra's armchair, Shizuo's grip around the switchblade unconsciously tightened, the metal bending under the force of his inhuman strength and turning into a useless mass of what was now junk. He almost regretted it since crushing the weapon within his hand hadn't been his intention, but the way Izaya minutely narrowed his eyes and tightened his lips into a straight line was proof that seeing the switchblade destroyed had upset the flea and that was enough to make him feel better. Shizuo could even go so far as to call it 'payment' for the many shirts the insect had destroyed over time.

"Well, if you'll excuse me, I think I'll go home now," Izaya announced as he stood up and reached for his jacket, not succeeding in grabbing it before Shinra's hand was on his wrist, pulling it away and pushing him back in the armchair, gently. "Hey, what are you—"

Shinra raised a hand, effectively silencing the obviously irritated informant. "You're in no condition to be walking around." A snort came from Shizuo's direction but Shinra ignored him in favor of reasoning with Izaya who was once again trying to get up. "You got your head banged up pretty badly. There's a high chance you'll end up passing out in the middle of the street. Is that how you want your humans to see you?"

"You don't need to worry about that, flea, since I'm going to break your neck right here, right now," Shizuo promised, letting go of the crushed switchblade and trying to get past Celty who was once again trying to stop him from getting his hands on the disgusting louse polluting the air with his mere presence.

[Shizuo, please, I understand that you hate him, but he's been hurt pretty badly (by you might I add) and I don't think you're the kind of person to kick people (or insects) while they're down,] Celty tried, but her friend's glare meant that she wasn't being successful in trying to reason with him.

Pushing Celty out of the way, he moved to grab Izaya, but the Dullahan's shadowy smoke wrapped around his wrists and ankles, trying to pull him back while Shinra, even though he was kind of a coward, was standing between him and the bastard Shizuo was going to kill once and for all. Rotating his head to the side, he glowered at Celty. "Let go," he growled threateningly. "Besides, even if I rip his head off, he'll probably still live for a while, just like a cockroach."

"Better a cockroach than a neanderthal~" Izaya teased from behind Shinra, standing up and smirking like he was in no danger of being throttled by a beast.

"That's it, you're dead!" Shizuo roared and lunged himself at Izaya, Celty's shadows barely slowing him down. He was so blinded by rage that he didn't even notice how hard he'd pushed Shinra out of the way, his attention set solely on the insect running around the room despite the injuries Shizuo had already inflicted.

Celty failed to stop Shizuo from going after Izaya, but she at least succeeded in stopping Shinra from violently crashing into the wall, her irritation towards the way Shizuo was acting skyrocketing and turning into anger. [Are you okay?]

"I'm good, but could you please do something about these two idiots," Shinra whined and immediately ran into the hallway when a vase flew past his head and shattered into the wall behind him.

[I'll be right back,] Celty quickly typed and she was out the door (which was no longer there), leaving Shinra to cry in despair every time more of his belongings got destroyed by the two brutes using his apartment as their personal battlefield. He was almost relieved when Celty rode past him on Shooter even though it was inside the house, but that feeling quickly disappeared and he ended up shouting in anger when Izaya threw a cup at Shizuo, breaking it. "Hey, that's the cup my darling Celty bought for me!"

"Sorry~" Izaya apologized while jumping over the counter and rushing towards the balcony where Celty was waiting for him. Her shadows wrapped around him and she was jumping over the balcony on Shooter, gravity pulling them down for what felt like forever before she used her black shadows to latch unto the building and land safely below.

"IIZAAYAAA!" Shizuo roared his archenemy's name, crushing the balcony's rail beneath his fingers as he fought the impulse to jump over it and go after Izaya. With Celty protecting him, Shizuo's chances of capturing the pest without hurting his friend were slim, and he didn't want to end up injuring her (even though she healed quickly) because of a pathetic excuse for a human being called Orihara Izaya. "Next time I catch you in Ikebukuro, you're dead, you hear me? You're dead!" he promised as he watched Celty ride out into the night with Izaya.

"I expect you and Izaya to pay for the damages," Shinra sighed as he removed his glasses and rubbed his tired eyes.

"It's the damn louse's fault that—"

"No! Just no, I don't want to hear it," Shinra shouted angrily as he put his glasses back on and ran a twitchy hand through dark grey locks. "You can't blame Izaya for everything that goes wrong in your life."

Shizuo's lip curled upwards and he was snarling, fingers flexing with the urge to punch Shinra in the face for being an idiot. "But it is Izaya's fault, and you _know_ it."

"I disagree," the doctor demurred and was about to bend down to pick up Izaya's jacket when Shizuo was suddenly in his face, curling a fist into his shirt and raising him in the air like he weighed nothing. Fear suddenly spiked and he paled, realizing in hindsight that he shouldn't have pissed off an already enraged Ikebukuro monster.

"I dare you to say that again!" Shizuo voice boomed inside the wrecked living room.

A pathetic whimper nearly climbed up his throat but Shinra managed to suppress it, the anger he felt towards the blond whose mercy he was at giving him the strength to speak his mind. "You're the one who pushed him away when Izaya only wanted to be your friend."

"Ha! What that soulless bastard wanted was another idiot to use for his schemes," Shizuo snorted and dangled Shinra in his hold as punishment for speaking nonsense.

"How do you know what he wanted when you didn't even give him a chance?" Shinra exploded in a fit of fury, manifesting itself through raised arms trying to hit the big idiot who was still not letting him go. "You broke his heart, you bastard!" he blurted before he could stop himself, immediately pulling back his hands and clamping them over his mouth when he realized what he'd just said.

At first, Shizuo dismissed the statement as nonsense, and it wasn't until the doctor covered his mouth and gave him a look that said he'd just revealed something he shouldn't have that Shizuo felt like his entire world had just been turned upside down.


End file.
